My Diagnoses :
September 29th, 2015
It has been 11 weeks since surgery and I have been doing well. The incision sites are healing well and i didn't have any complications. About 3 weeks ago I went to see the Oncologist for medicine and clinical study purposes. I knew from the beginning that i wasn't going to try any drugs or studies. My surgeon recommended going so i did. We talked with her and what she recommended was a PET scan before we went further with her. With this scan they get another look at my whole body (i had a ct scan earlier this year and is around the same thing) The PET scans smallest readable margins are 1/2 cm to 1 cm. With the tiny microscopic amount of cells i had left after the surgery (see below) i decided to pass with the scan for now, for the sake of saving my body from further radiation. I met with my surgeon after the oncologist and made my decision to not do the next extensive surgery since there were so many complications and a larger morbidity rate then i am comfortable with. He respected my decision and i have further appointments set up with him. For the time being until the end of the year i will go to the dermatologist 2 more times to check for any more abnormal moles and follow up with the surgeon I have completely changed my eating habits and am seeing another doctor for probiotics and other natural supplements. I am focusing on cleansing my body from the inside out but also watching my skin as well.
July 24, 2015
12 days Post Op we went back in for a follow up with my surgeon. Him and his colleges reviewed my pathology with the Nebraska Medicine cancer and oncology board this past week. The margins they took from the initial mole site came back clean. As well as the mole on my left shoulder. Pre-cancerous but still clean. They also removed 8 (or so) lymph nodes in surgery, 5 of them being sentinel (first in the strand). All of them were clean except for one, a sentinel one. My stage has gone from II up to III. What they recommend now is a neck dissection. They go in through the same neck incision but take it further up towards my chin and over more to my ear. This procedure is more invasive than the first. They take up to 50 lymph nodes from the area along with tissue leaving my neck "sunk in" after surgery. It puts my "smile" nerve at risk as well as a nerve going to my shoulder. Partial feeling in my neck I will not regain due to cutting through nerves. I meet with the oncologist August 6th at 8am to talk about clinical trial treatments and the upcoming surgery if we decide to go through with it. Then we talk to my surgeon and plan a date for surgery.
July 1, 2015
I had a 1.9 millimeter tumor under the initial mole that was removed from the left side of my face about two inches from my ear on my jaw line. The dermatologist stressed that she got ALL of the tumor (they were so sure because they found clean cells underneath the tumor because she dug so deep). This means I currently have Stage IIB Melanoma skin cancer. I went to see Dr. Panwar at Nebraska Medicine early in June. I had a CAT scan, X-rays, an EKG and blood drawn. The cancer is no where else in my body as of right now. He talked to me about what we do for my face. For Melanoma they take out a 2 centimeter margin around the initial spot. Since it is on my face, they do 1 centimeter. That requires plastic surgery as well to fill the hole and make sure the skin is tight. They also inject radioactive dye into my face to locate the lymph nodes. They will go in and take out the first lymph node and test it for cancer. If it is not in the first lymph node then I am clean because lymph nodes only allow "one way travel". If it is in the first one then my staging changes to stage III. Right now I have surgery scheduled for July 13th at 7:50am to clean the initial spot and take the first lymph node out. Hopefully this is my first and last surgery. Recovery time is anywhere from 2-4 weeks. As for the rest of my body and the other moles I have, I will be going to the dermatologist every 3 months for 2 years. I have had 3 more moles removed since the first and they have all been "pre-cancerous" which means we caught them in time.